


Before The West Was Won

by Raisintorte



Category: Stargate SG-1
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-11-03
Updated: 2008-11-03
Packaged: 2017-10-19 10:07:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,417
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/199686
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Raisintorte/pseuds/Raisintorte
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Daniel, Cam, and a cow named Bessie.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Before The West Was Won

**Author's Note:**

> Spoilers through Bad Guys.
> 
> For Facetofcathy for the sg_rarepairings ficathon. Thanks to smittywing for beating the story for me. :-) Beating is the best kind of beta. Thanks to wojelah for the last minute cheer leading and futzing.

"You can't tell me you didn't love that, Jackson! You always remember your first time taking hostages, right?" Cam slapped Daniel on the shoulder from the passenger seat of their rented SUV.

"Yes, and it turned out so well," Daniel responded dryly. Daniel had been kind of quiet since the mission and Cam knew him too well to let it go - he knew Daniel had been upset they'd had to take the hostages. Cam left his hand on Daniel's shoulder and squeezed a bit for comfort.

"Zero casualties on both sides? I call that a win. Granted, it was probably the worst first contact ever, but there's something to be said for that, too. I do have to say - your performance there - saying there's gonna be killing? - Really, Jackson? _Really?_?" Cam snickered as he pulled a map out of the glove compartment to check their route. Dr. Lee had given them some fancy GPS unit, but Cam enjoyed good old orienteering.

"I was improvising!" Daniel said defensively as he kept his eyes on the road. "I'm not exactly experienced at this whole hostage-taking thing. Usually we're on the other end."

Cam had to smile at that. He had been taken hostage more times in the two years since joining SG-1 than in his entire military career.

"Besides," Daniel continued, "Like you could do better! If I recall correctly, your portrayal of a purveyor of space crack didn't exactly win you an Oscar."

Daniel had a good point - that probably hadn't been one of Cam's finer moments. Cam checked the map against the directions Lee had given them. The power spike had only been for a few seconds so they were just looking for a spot on a map. "All right. Looks like we should be getting off the highway shortly. Didn't Lee say this place should be pretty easy to find?"

"I don't recall, I was trying to think of a way to get out of coming on this fools' errand. This isn't exactly how I wanted to spend our downtime" Daniel's tone suggested he wasn't as annoyed as he was pretending to be, which was good. While they hadn't talked about it, Cam knew the would have ended up spending part of their downtime together, so this wasn't totally a bad thing. Daniel might have had some other small plans, but they grabbed time together whenever they could.

Cam loved SG-1 and all the trappings that came with it, but it was nice to get away for a short break. "It's not a fools' errand! Someone had to check out that odd power jolt thing. Besides, when was the last time we had a nice adventure on earth?" Living with the outstanding threat of Adria and the still-going-strong Ori war didn't exactly leave them all much free time. They'd had a few breaks lately, but those were few and far between.

Daniel looked away from the road and right at Cam. "Seriously? Are you forgetting about the bounty hunters who crashed your high school reunion a few weeks back?"

Cam ignored Daniel and consulted the map. "Turn left at the next intersection, it's about 2 miles up the road."

Daniel slowed down and pulled into the right lane of the highway. "Conveniently forgetting about that, are we?"

"Convenient? Not so much. I wish I could forget!" Cam groaned, rembering the reunion, and the fall out after, in all too vivid detail. "I'm pretty sure I've been dis-invited from every future high school reunion, school function, awards ceremonies, _ever_. Anyway - where's your sense of adventure? This power spike thing could be a treasure trove of ancient goodies just waiting for you to decipher them! Just think of the things we might find! The discoveries!"

Daniel gave Cam a sideways glance and rolled his eyes. "Of course. You know what this power spike probably is? Some kooky farmer building something illegal in his basement or cellar."

"Didn't Orlin build a mini-Stargate in Sam's basement?" Cam shot back quickly. For all the grief he took about memorizing SG-1's files, it certainly came in handy. Especially with Daniel - knowledge was power. "And what about the barber from Indiana? Joe? Didn't he get one of those fancy ancient stones at a garage sale?"

"Yes, and Orlin was a rogue Ancient! I _highly_ doubt there are rouge Ancients just floating around Patwomba, Iowa," Daniel retorted. "And, yes, you are correct about Joe - but the chances of that happening again are small!"

"And you probably wouldn't have thought there would be alien bounty hunters floating around Kansas, but there were." Cam loved tangling with Jackson. He knew that comment would get his goat up.

"Oh! Now it's convenient for you to think about the bounty hunters. I see how it is!" Daniel grumbled as he turned off the highway. "What are we looking for next?"

"X marks the spot about a mile up the road." He enjoyed working with everyone on SG-1, but it was different with Jackson. It had meant something . . . _more_ to get Jackson to sign back on. Prior to his accident Cam had briefly met Daniel once or twice in passing while he was flying 302's and then Daniel visited him in the hospital a few times after antarctica, but since joining SG-1 they'd become friends, or well, _more_ than friends.

"I notice neither Sam nor Teal'c volunteered to join us. Even Vala didn't want to come, and she'll usually do anything to get off the base." Daniel noted wryly.

"Sam had a meeting at area 51, Teal'c was needed on Daktara, and Vala wanted to come, but SG-3 just needed her more!" Cam ticked off the other members of SG-1 on his fingers. He was pretty sure if either he or Daniel had asked, they would have tagged along.

Daniel raised his eyebrows at Cam's last point. "Oh yes, I saw the look of joy on Colonel Reynold's face when she bounced into the gateroom."

"He'll be happy for her experience when they're off-world." Even Cam couldn't keep a straight face as he said - as much as he loved Vala, she was sometimes a bit of handful off-world.

Daniel snorted at that. "I'm sure he will."

Reynolds had worked with Vala a few times and had enough experience to know his "routine" trading mission wouldn't be boring. Vala had been anxious to go with SG-3, which meant there likely something on that planet she wanted, and even more likely it didn't belong to her. And that was sure to lead to trouble. Daniel must have been thinking along the same lines because he snickered. "Whatcha laughing at?"

Daniel grinned. "Just thinking of the phone call we're sure to get a few hours asking us to beam up to the Odyssey to go spring SG-3 from PX3-353's dungeon."

"Nah, they won't need springing - besides - Odyssey's out of town - that's why we're driving instead of beaming, remember? Between Reynolds and Vala, they'll find a way out. I'm sure it will be amusing - or it will certainly sound that way when Vala tell's it to us. I bet Reynold's report will be a little drier." Cam consulted the map again, and then pulled out Lee's GPS. "Okay, it should be right up on the left." Cam looked to the left and saw nothing but corn fields. Miles and miles of Iowa corn. "I don't see anything, do you?"

"Nope. Told you - fools' errand."

"Oh, shush, Jackson. Pull over. It came from the field just up on the left there. Pull over"

"Fine." Daniel pulled the car over and turned off the engine.

Cam snagged Lee's fancy GPS device from the glove box, and jumped out of the car. There was no energy spike now, but they had a location, and it was a big, empty, cow pasture. "Guess you were wrong about the basement thing. I mean, well, there could be a storm cellar, but it would have to be a pretty damn big one"

Daniel came up alongside him. "Guess so. Bit odd to have an energy surge that strong coming from an empty field."

"Just a _little_. See, all signs point to buried treasure trove!" Cam reached the point where the device said the power surge had come from. "We might have to get the Odyssey here to beam us in. . . . Jackson?" While Cam had been talking, Daniel had dropped to his knees and started pushing around in the grass. From the look of concentration on his face, he appeared to have found something.

"I think I found . . ." Cam heard the woosh of the rings coming out of the ground before he saw them form around them, cutting Daniel off. He still wasn't used to the jarring sensation that went with being transported.

* * *

"Mooooooooooooo!" It was pitch-black in the chamber so Cam couldn't see Daniel or anything else for that matter, until his eyes adjusted. He was trying to figure out where they were, and how best to point out that there was a secret hideaway without gloating _too_ much.

"I assume that wasn't you mooing?" Daniel's voice came from Cam's left.

"Nope. All your parts make it with you?" Cam reached out and found Daniel's wrist, then his hand, squeezing it lightly as he spoke.

"Yup. You seeing what I'm seeing?" Daniel kept ahold of Cam's hand while he spoke. "Is that a cow? And oh god, what is that _smell_?"

"Well, if that's a cow, and I'm pretty sure it is, then that smell is dung." Cam said matter-of-factly. He was enough of a Kansas boy to know a cow when he saw one. And dung when he smelled it.

"Lovely. So, not a guy in a basement - a cow found an abandoned ring platform in a field and managed to activate it. Fantastic. Let's find the panel and get out of here." Daniel's voice dripped with sarcasm.

"Sounds good. The room seems pretty small, let's see if we can find a light switch while were at it," Cam suggested, brushing his thumb against Daniel's palm before he let go. "I'll go left, you go right?"

"Sure." Cam felt Daniel move past him and wished he'd gone with the traditional offer of dinner and a movie instead of this hare-brained scheme. He ran his hands across the nearest wall - smooth metal - but then Daniel said, "Aha!" and the lights came on.

Cam looked around, his eyes adjusting to the light. They were in a small room, no bigger than 10 by 10 feet, metal walls, metal floors, with a large jersey cow in the middle. If an Ancient had once used this for storage, Cam and Daniel were too late - whatever was being stored was long gone. "Awesome." Cam skirted the cow and stepped up next to Daniel.

Daniel was poking at a panel in the wall and seemed pretty pleased with what he'd found. "It's intact," he said. "Let's get out of here."

"Hold on, hold on. Before we go anywhere, we have to liberate Bessie, here." Cam looked pointedly at the very disgruntled cow and back to Daniel.

Daniel took stock of Bessie, his great big brain clearly going into overtime, and then he grimaced. "Of course we do." Daniel glared at Bessie, and Bessie gave Daniel what could best be described as a withering look in return, or well, as close to a withering look Cam had ever seen on a cow. "How do you suggest we do this?'

Cam really hadn't thought that far in advance, so he started eyeing Bessie from every available angle. "I'll position her, you activate the rings?" Cam approached Bessie from the side and started trying to nudge her toward the ring platform. It didn't take much prodding (and a little avoiding of cow crap) to get her into the right spot. Cam backed off the platform and Daniel activated the rings. "Now, see, wasn't that fun?" he asked as Bessie dissolved into a column of light with an offended moo. "A nice little adventure?"

Daniel looked at him like he was crazy. "You fight aliens for a living and you think returning a cow to its home is an _adventure_? Of course you do."

Cam grinned. "Dial her up, Jackson. Let's get out of here and enjoy the rest of our brief downtime." Cam stepped into the center of the ring platform and turned toward Daniel. Daniel pushed the first button on the ring device and sparks started flying. Daniel jumped back and Cam jumped forward and caught him around the waist. "You okay?" Cam assessed Daniel and couldn't see anything visually wrong with him.

"Yeah, but I think that platform is shot." Daniel moved back to the panel and poked around a bit. "Yeah, totally shot. I think we'll need a crystal or something" Daniel looked, and sounded, a little glum.

"I would volunteer to check it out, but I have a feeling I might break it further. Lee said he'd send in the mounties if we didn't check in by 8:00 p.m." Cam checked his watch. "I have 4:00 p.m. We can totally do four hours. Come on Jackson! Four hours should be child's play for you!" Cam slung his arm over Daniel's shoulder and pulled him in tight.

"And now all we have to do is hope Lee is able to find us. Fantastic." Daniel grumbled a bit, but he leaned into Cam. "I expect this stuff off world, not on earth - though I should know better by now."

"Buck up Jackson! They'll find us - that's what those handy transmitters in our arms were for! The Apollo should be back today or tomorrow and if not the F-302's will find us. It will be _fine_ " Cam was watching Daniel - he could tell Daniel wasn't really upset - just frustrated and a bit cranky. Cam snagged Daniel's wrist and pulled him so they were face to face. "Anyway, since we have nothing better to do . . . and this was always part of the plan . . . " Cam rested his arms loosely around Daniel's waist and kissed him.

Daniel wrapped his arms about Cam's waist and leaned into for a kiss for a second before pulling back. "So this is what you were planning when you very subtly arranged for us to have some time alone together?" Daniel nipped at Cam's lips.

"Oh yeah." And then Cam snuggled into Daniel and thought of many fun ways they could pass the time until someone came to get them.


End file.
